A/N: All right, everyone! Sorry it's been nearly a month. A persky hurricane got in the way, and then after everything got back to normal, I got buried in schoolwork. Anyway, here's a new chapter. Kinda short and sorta filler material, but I'm just glad to be able to give you guys something. I won't make any promises on when the new chapter will be up, but it shouldn't be another month-long wait. Love you guys, and hope you keep reading!
EXPRESSING MY LOVE
- 7 -
The Morning After
As the minutes got closer and closer to midnight, Autumn was a silent town. The whir of Logan's car as it came to a rest in his grandmother's driveway seemed loud enough to wake the entire block, and all Logan wanted to do was get inside, maybe get a little something to eat, and go straight to bed. He carefully entered as quietly as possible, cringing when the front door closed with a loud click. He poured himself a bowl of cereal and ate in front of a muted sitcom rerun. He figured his parents and grandma were all long asleep, and he looked forward to joining them in a world where nothing was real and reality was irrelevant.
He stalked down the hallway to his room, but just as he was almost there, he could hear his name being called to him from the walls.
"Logan," the feeble voice said. "Logan..."
Maybe he would have shit his pants had he not known immediately where the voice was coming from.
"Grandma, what are you doing still awake?" he asked when he entered his grandmother's dark bedroom. He carefully walked through the pitch blackness to turn on the bedside lamp.
"I can't sleep," the old woman answered.
Her frail, weak body was tucked under a warm quilt, her black and grey hair pinned up so as not to constantly fall down over her eyes. Her face was gaunt, and it was no secret to anyone who knew Clara Mitchell that her time left on Earth wasn't long. Still, though, there was a certain look in her eye that kept the fiery spirit of her youth alive and sharp, and that look was there as Logan sat on the chair next to her bed.
"You can't sleep?" Logan asked in a very doctor-like voice. He'd been taking advantage of this whole situation in order to prepare for his future career. It sorta seemed selfish and opportunistic, but it wasn't like he was ever close to the woman. Before moving to Autumn, he'd only met her five times, most of which were when he was younger than ten years old.
"I understand you had quite a few visitors today," he said. "You were very busy."
"I sleep all day," Grandma replied in her husky voice. "And I listen to my son go on and on and on and on 'bout things from a long time ago."
"Well, then, you should be tired."
"I'm not," she dismissed his concern. "What I want to know is...where'd you go tonight?"
Logan's eyebrows went up, and he kinda smirked. "I didn't go anywhere."
"Yes, you did. You just got in. I'm not stupid."
Logan tried to think of a way to convince her that she'd been wrong, but it hit him - shit, if she knew what she was talking about, why try to BS her?
"I went to a place called the Wild Cherry."
"Oh, lord," Grandma sighed, a crooked smile forming on her face as she rolled her beady eyes and shook her head. "That place."
"You know it?" Logan asked, amused by her reaction.
"Know it!? I was there at the beginnin'," she said. "I helped make that place what it is today. Did you go all by yourself? 'Cause ifin' you wanted company, I coulda went with you."
Logan chuckled. "No, I went with a friend."
"Oh, good," she said. "Tell me, is she pretty?"
Logan hesitated, not sure what to say. As far as he knew, Grandma thought he was straight. He hadn't tried to hide anything from her, but so far, there hadn't been much to hide anyway. The only way she would have known was if he or his parents had told her, and he'd expressly told his parents to not tell her.
"Oh wait, no," she then said. "I got that all wrong. Tell me, is he handsome?"
"Uh..."
"Come on, don't be shy!"
He wondered how in the world she knew, but he felt obliged to give her an answer. "Uh...yeah, he is. I think he is, at least." And it kinda warmed his heart to think about how handsome Kendall really was and the fact that he was talking about this with his grandmother.
"Good," she approved, nodding. "There ain't nothin' better than a country boy."
Logan nodded absently, not really agreeing but just marveling at the fact that this was the conversation they were having. Up until this point, all they'd ever talked about was the side-effects of her medicine and what was happening on The Bold and the Beautiful.
"And, in case you're wonderin'," she added, "I just have ways of knowin'. Does you no good to ask me how, though, so don't."
"I wasn't gonna bother," he said, shaking his head in disbelief. Just then, he let out a big yawn.
"Now, you go on to sleep," Grandma ordered. "If anybody's tired here, it's you. And if you went out to the Wild Cherry with a boy, you oughta be dead tired."
Logan nodded, once again yawning and stretching. "Call me if you need anything," he told her as he got up from his chair.
"I will," she promised. "And you call me if you need anything."
He smiled at her, nodded again, and left the room.
There was a way of life in Autumn that anyone could easily set their watch by. Certain things could just be counted on, and chief among these things was where the vast majority of the town could be found on Sunday mornings.
"Let us pray," the minister instructed in his strong, authoritative voice. He stood before his people - God's people - as they all bowed their heads and began to pray. He'd been the leader of the church for thirty-five years, and literally every single Sunday service he'd presided over had followed the exact same format, the same format that had been followed by the minister before him and the minister before him. Tradition was immortal in Autumn, and just about everyone in town would not have had it any other way.
On the fifth pew from the front, Kendall sat and prayed like good God-fearin' young men were supposed to. He prayed for his own well-being, he prayed for the well-being of the few people he had left in his life to really care about, and he also prayed for the general well-being of the world. Most of all, though, he prayed for Logan and himself and for the hope that they would only bring into each other's lives the very best of everything.
"Amen," he whispered along with the other churchgoers.
"All right, Kendall Knight, I bit my tongue all throughout church this mornin', but now I can't hold it any longer. Tell me why in the world you got all of those bandages on you!"
Kendall stood with Hazel and her family just outside the church. This was another one of those Autumn traditions - everyone would socialize for a while immediately following the service.
"They look worse than what they actually are," Kendall tried to play it down bashfully. Somehow, telling her that he'd gotten into a barroom brawl over a guy he was attracted to didn't seem like that great of an idea. She was already reaching for a bandage, though, peaking underneath at the steadily healing cut on his forehead.
"Oh my God!" she gasped, and her husband pulled her hand away from Kendall's head.
"Leave the kid alone, Hazel," he said, winking at Kendall. "It looks like he got himself into a man's fight last night. I'd hate to see what the other fella looks like."
"The other fellas," Tara corrected as she joined them. Kendall rolled his eyes as she and Hazel exchanged hugs and cheek kisses. "Our heavyweight champion here got into it real big last night with Billy Joe Conley and them morons he's always goin' 'round with," she explained, subtly teasing him with her eyes.
Hazel gasped again. "Billy Joe Conley!? Kendall, what were you thinkin'?"
"It wasn't a big deal," he shrugged. He wasn't crazy about all of this concern being heaped upon him, but a small part of it liked the feeling of a mother worrying herself over him.
"Not a big deal?!" Hazel repeated in disbelief. "You were at that Wild Cherry again, wasn't you? Answer me!"
He nodded. "I only went for a lil while."
"Kendall, if I've told you once, I've told you twenty times," she fussed, "that place is not the type of place you need to be spendin' your time at. Look at what's happened to you! Thank the Lord, our Father, you have a good woman like Tara in your life to help put some sense into that hard head of yours."
"Uh..." he replied, trying to figure out what she was implying.
"Oh, I had no part in that," Tara clarified. "I watched from the sideline, and when it was all over with, I went right home to get a good night's rest for church."
"Oh?" Hazel asked, just mildly disappointed. "Well, anyway, I think it'd be a very good idea if you kept an eye on this one for a while. So long as he's goin' 'round startin' fights with Billy Joe Conley and what-not. He needs someone with common sense to straighten him out."
"I'll be fine," Kendall suddenly blurted out, a palpable frustration emitting from his words as he turned from them and walked away to his truck.
Hazel just shook her head. Sure, deep inside she felt a little guilty for exploiting Kendall's incident to play matchmaker, but for the most part, she resolved to stand firm in her intention to get him paired up with somebody's daughter in this town. Ever since that morning at the diner a week and a half earlier, it had been weighing on her mind that she needed to do something to help the son of her deceased best friend out, and there were way too many fine young women in Autumn for him to be all alone.
That afternoon, Logan decided to help his parents out by going through some of the boxes upon boxes upon boxes of old papers and photographs that his grandma had saved up over the years. It wasn't like she was a hoarder or anything - everything had been neatly stored away in the attic - but there was just so much stuff, some of it decades old, and the nerd in him kinda liked the idea of unearthing some long-forgotten family treasure.
Of course, he also needed time to think. Seated on the back porch and with several large boxes ready to be rummaged through, he set about his work, but instead of thoughts and memories of his family's distant past, his mind was filled with thoughts of the young man who lived alone about five minutes away.
Kendall.
Logan had quickly gone to sleep the night before, and it had been a dreamless one, not one where he'd somehow concocted an entirely far-fetched future for Kendall and himself based on the strength of just a few kisses and a very brief heart-to-heart. Now, though, that he was a awake, he couldn't stop himself from daydreaming about what the near future would hold. What exactly would come of this newfound friendship, and how long would it last?
He dug through the first box, finding nothing really out of the ordinary. Old recipes from old magazines, coupons that had been carefully clipped but were evidently never used, newspaper obituaries for his grandma's old friends and classmates, and other things of the like. Underwhelmed, Logan stopped digging and just sighed.
I want to see him again. I want to see him now.
But maybe it was too soon? He could have blown off the storage boxes and headed on over to Kendall's trailer, but it could have ended up being extremely awkward. What if Kendall wasn't ready yet for daily visits and just wanted to take things slow? Logan didn't want to rush him or ignore his feelings - he'd made that mistake before, and it still hurt him deeply.
He pushed the first box aside, pretty sure that, aside from the obituraries, all of its contents could be filed away in the garbage. The next box had more of the same, but it also had old pieces of fabric, obviously meant to be sewn together into something but never quite making it that far. There were dress patterns and instructions to go along with them, and the crafty part of Logan decided that it should all be saved.
He probably woke up this morning and regrets everything that happened last night.
What if he went to see Kendall, and Kendall immediately told him that they couldn't be friends or anything to each other anymore? What if Kendall said that he'd only suffered a moment of weakness and that being a fag was not what he wanted and that he'd kick Logan's ass if he ever came around again or told anyone about what they'd done?
"Grrr," he let out as he balled up a yellowed Dear Abby clipping from 1978. It felt like he'd made absolutely no progress at all. Here he was, back at square one, wondering whether or not this boy actually felt the same as him. Of course, the simple fact that Kendall had told him that he did feel the same way should have been some kind of comfort, but Logan knew all too well that feelings change and what a boy feels one night can be dead and buried by the morning. It would have been so much easier if Kendall would just take the lead and
He dug through the third box, where he found more advice column clippings. His grandmother sure did keep weird things. He tore through the clippings, wishing he could just turn off his emotions and never feel anything for anyone anymore, but just as he was about to give up on the boxes and on the thought of he and Kendall being more than friends, he retrieved a folded Dear Abby from the bottom of the box. He opened the article, but interestingly, there was no "Dear Abby" portion, just the advice she'd wanted to pass on to the writer of the letter.
"Dear Scared to Try Again,
It's understandable that you still suffer from heartache when you think about the failed relationship in your past. We all need a little time to get past such things. But what better way to do that than to start a new relationship with someone else? The pain you harbor from the past may have you feeling unsure of the possibility something happening with the new man in your life, but you'll never know what'll be until you take the initiative. Yes, your heart may be broken again, but then you'll have two heartbreaks under your belt, and you'll be all the stronger for it. On the other hand, this could be the start of something beautiful. You'll never know unless you go for it!"
And it was as if the fates were all trying to tell him something. Logan held the clipping in his hand for a few seconds and let the 35-year-old advice seep into his head. There was no reason at all for him to be sitting here merely wondering how Kendall felt, and so he worked up the will, got up, and decided to go pay his new friend a visit.
Kendall sat in the backyard at Hazel's house, a mere three streets over from where Logan's grandmother lived. This was another part of the Sunday routine - the afternoon would be spent sitting here with a beer in hand, listening as Hazel's husband and some of his pals talked about the "good ol' days" in Autumn. He'd decided that morning after church that he wasn't gonna be present this week, but the inner pressure to please everyone around him had won out, and here he was, exactly where everyone in town would expect him to be.
"Hey there, Knight, I hear you got yourself into a big ol' bust-up last night at the Cherry," one of the men said. They all sat on buckets and old ice chests, and Hazel's husband periodically got up to check the barbecue grill.
"Heh," Kendall smirked, not wanting to get into it with them. He was a damn good fighter, but he hated the pathetic way the people in this town would get filled with glee as he recounted his fights to them. "It wasn't anything."
"Well, from what I hear, it was over the pretty little girl you been seen 'round town with," the man said, a gross twinkle in his eye.
"No, that wasn't it," Kendall answered, trying to stay cool but getting increasingly annoyed. He sat far away from the others and kept his head low. He was not in the mood for this shit at all.
"I think it's high time you go out there and get you some, boy," the man said, soliciting smoky chuckles from the others. "What's her name? Tara? If I was a couple years younger, Lord knows I'd try a thing or two!"
As they all descended into creepy conversation about their ancient sexcapades from many years ago, Kendall zoned out completely, letting his mind fall squarely on Logan once again. He greatly regretted coming here, for he would have much rather spent this Sunday afternoon with Logan...getting to know him more, just like he'd said he'd wanted to do. But, he decided, there would be time enough for that. Despite the annoyance he was feeling from his company, the promise of spending the summer with Logan loosened him up and made him smile.
Logan sat in his car for a few minutes, remembering the last time he'd gone to Kendall's house and was just ready to leave. Kendall had come around the corner in his truck, and they'd ended up getting one step closer to the climax that had occurred the night before. And so he waited...and waited...and waited. His car was turned off, so he was surrounded by the sounds of the countryside - the birds, the wind, and few things else.
He's not here because he knew you'd be coming back for him. He didn't want to see you, and so he left. He doesn't want you. He's scared of you, remember? He's scared of what you're gonna make him do, and he's scared of what you're gonna turn him into, and-
Logan hated this about himself, his need to beat himself up and always expect the worse. Maybe there were some good explanations for why Kendall wasn't home, but he wouldn't allow himself to accept them. No, in his mind, this meant only one thing - Kendall realized he'd made a mistake the night before, and now he was avoiding Logan the best way he could.
I wish he would just tell me that, because then I'd just avoid him and he could go back to living his life.
He was an inch away from turning the ignition when he could hear the rumbling roar of a truck in the distance. He's coming. He sat still and quietly, afraid that if he made too much noise, he'd lose the sound of the approaching truck, and it'd never arrive. He carefully smoothed out his hair and licked his lips, subconsciously wanting to look his best for when Kendall would get there, but when he opened the car door and got out to meet him, he was dismayed to see that it wasn't Kendall's truck he'd heard coming. No, this truck was more beat-up and sounded like it was on its last legs. Still, though, this truck slowed down and pulled into Kendall's driveway. Logan clung to his door handle, afraid of what was going to happen.
"Hey, is Knight in there?"
It was Lance, one of Kendall's "friends" from the Wild Cherry. Logan let out a small sigh of relief, glad to see a somewhat familiar face, but he kept his guard up.
"No, he's not here," he answered, smiling because, for some reason, he wanted to make a good impression on this moron.
"Oh," Lance replied, nodding. He seemed much nicer now, and Logan felt like maybe he wasn't so bad after all.
"Hey, let me ask you somethin', 'kay?" Lance said, looking at Logan with serious eyes.
"Sure. What is it?"
"You been in this town for what...two minutes?"
"A few weeks."
"Right," Lance nodded. "That ain't a long time."
"No," Logan agreed, though he was getting suspicious of what Lance was getting at.
"Right, it ain't been a long time at all. But you and Knight sure have gotten close in them few weeks."
Fuck, Logan thought. He knows. "Well, uh...he helped me with a few things. My car had some problems, so...yeah, he helped me with that, and..."
Lance just nodded as Logan gave up on trying to explain. "That's cool. That's all right. I guess I was just thinkin' that it was funny yesterday how Knight called me and told me he was sick and was gonna be laid up in bed all day long, but when I passed through here yesterday 'round noon, your car was parked right there where it's parked now."
"I wasn't here long," Logan tried to explain, though he could sense it was too late for that. "I realized he wasn't feelin' well, so I left. I wasn't even here for five minutes."
Lance nodded ominously again, as if every time he detected bullshit, he just stored it away in the back of his mind for future use.
"That's cool, I said," he reiterated to Logan. He looked at Logan with strong eyes. Not menacing, but not exactly friendly, either. "Look, if you see him, tell him I stopped by, all right?"
"All right."
Lance barreled out of the driveway and vanished down the road. Logan got back into his car. He thought about waiting again for Kendall, but after this strange episode, he was ready to get back to his grandma's house, where he'd get into bed and hopefully drift back off to sleep.
What have I gotten myself into?